Late But Not Forgotten: Shelley Duvall (1949-2024)
Saturday, July 20, 2024 at 10:00PM 
Shelley Duvall behind the scenes of her last film, THE FOREST HILLS (2023).
First of all, preemptive apologies for the solipsism.
For the past few weeks, I've been struggling with a mounting number of celebrity deaths, each deserving of a tribute. Yet, with every single one comes the need for research, and then, when I think I'll be able to write a good obituary, another loss hits. For a while, I considered doing a giant post, built from essential information on each dear departed artist. It wouldn't be akin to that extensive Donald Sutherland homage - to give an example - but it'd be something. Still, the work dragged on, the pressure mounted, and the delay was reaching absurd proportion. I can only say sorry, dear reader.
This past Wednesday, as I celebrated my 30th birthday, such affairs still haunted me. And maybe because I was surrounded by friends, basking in sincere affection, perchance a self-pitying reflection or two on the passage of time and getting older, a new approach materialized. Instead of trying to encapsulate a world-class artist's entire history in a write-up, I shall instead ponder what they mean to me personally. Earnestness is the way to go, and hopefully, you'll share what these people mean to you in the comments, too. These pieces will be relatively brief but heartfelt, and they'll start with a star I loved like few others – the inimitable Shelley Duvall…
THE SHINING (1980) Stanley Kubrick
Last year, to celebrate Shelley Duvall's 74th birthday, I wrote about her career, from those early Altman collaborations to a late-in-life turn in the indie horror Forest Hills. When considering all that I've written for The Film Experience, the piece remains one of my favorites. It's only right since Duvall, that beanpole star with a gentle thrill of a voice and big eyes, is also among my most beloved screen presences. She's also a miracle behind the scenes, as that write-up tried to explain. Though rumors prevail that Stanley Kubrick ruined Duvall through a traumatizing shoot for The Shining, her career flourished long after that King adaptation.
Her work producing Faerie Tale Theatre and other children TV endeavors is ground-breaking and era-defining, a gift whose wonders delight to this day. Where else will you find a young Tim Burton directing Aladdin and Coppola helming an Eiko Ishioka-designed take on Rip Van Winkle, Vanessa Redgrave and Gena Rowlands as iconic villains and so many other treasures? The words "Hello, I'm Shelley Duvall" fill one's heart with gleeful anticipation, and, for one magical moment, we're all kids again. There's no need for nostalgic attachment or former familiarity with the show since Duvall and company managed to capture something beyond time and place.
NASHVILLE (1975) Robert Altman
But of course, it would be unseemly for me to celebrate Duvall without more specific words about her acting. Her work with Altman is beyond reproach, even if, for both performer and director, her earliest turns were more instinctual than fine-tuned. However, nobody could deny Duvall's greatness after Thieves Like Us, a 1974 Cannes-competing period piece that saw her hone on the tragicomic potential of her visage, the oddball melancholy she carried to every role. Hers is the splendor of a tobacco-stained porcelain doll whose surface has already started splitting in hairline cracks. The actress performs a similar trick in Bernice Bobs Her Hair, an underseen marvel everyone should watch.
In Nashville, she's an awkward miracle. In Annie Hall, she's transplendent and hilarious. In 3 Women, she's out of this world, a most unmysterious mystery. Then came those 1980 critically panned creations, so unfairly attacked when they're both works of pure genius. At least, they are as far as Shelley Duvall is concerned. Her Wendy Torrance in The Shining is one of the greatest achievements of horror actressing ever recorded, cutting through the formalist madness with such palpable distress you can practically taste the woman's panic. With Popeye's Olive Oyl, it's a matter of perfect casting matched by an even more perfect performance.
POPEYE (1980) Robert Altman
Try watching her rendition of "He Needs Me" without falling for the cartoon made gangly flesh, all open wound vulnerability with a rubber-hosed physicality. It's such an impressive tour de force that, despite its reputation as a legendary flop, Popeye was in various major publications as a potential Best Actress Oscar nominee. I wish I lived in that alternative universe. Alas, Duvall never received that honor, not even in a non-competitive capacity, though her filmography continued to be littered with fascinating feats. Burton's Frankenweenie, Soderbergh's The Underneath, Campion's The Portrait of a Lady, and Maddin's Twilight of the Ice Nymphs, to name a few. She's even worth watching in such clichéd trash as The 4th Floor. What a star!
Logically, the few instances when her producing and acting projects overlapped deserve a special mention. Duvall's performance in the Faerie Tale Theatre episodes of Rumpelstiltskin and Rapunzel are minor delights, commanding the camera while playing believable storybook ingenues. As ever, she's an odd duck, capable of tender emotion without betraying the part's prevailing unreality. The same could be said of My Darlin' Clementine in Tall Tales & Legends, and Bo Peep in the loony Mother Goose Rock 'n' Rhyme. That production holds particular sentimental value for Duvall fans, for it was there that she met Dan Gilroy, a romantic partner of many years who was by her side to the end.
In the past few years, Seth Abramovitch's interview for The Hollywood Reporter and the indefatigable efforts of the Shelley Duvall Archive on social media helped rekindle the public's attention on her. They further dispelled pernicious narratives that had formed around the erstwhile leading lady, shedding light on the remarkable woman beneath the tabloid fodder, the artist whose gifts to us, her audience, should be enjoyed until the Earth dies and takes Humanity with it. I fear there will never be anyone else like Shelley Duvall on screen, but aren't we lucky that she found her way there at all? Aren't we lucky to witness such a unique talent? I think we are.
MOTHER GOOSE ROCK 'N' RHYME (1990) Jeff Stein
Please share your love for Shelley Duvall in the comments. What does the actress-turned-producer mean to you?
Reader Comments (7)
I grew up on 'Mother Goose Rock 'n' Rhyme' so to me she will always be Bo Beep. RIP Shelley
I too grew up on Mother Goose Rock N' Rhyme as that was an awesome film except for Brian Bonsall towards the end. I hate that kid.
Well, I'm a kid from the 80's so this feels personal. Loved her even before I heard of Nashville or 3 Women.
Shelley Duvall in The Shining is right up there with Veronica Cartwright in Alien for making the audience feel their catatonic fear seeping from the screen.
People also site Drew Barrymore in Scream but I can clearly see she's playing fear not feeling it.
Lovely tribute I think she's the 1977 deserving Best Actress winner over Keaton.
I enjoyed when she popped up in The Portrait of a Lady.
She deserved a Best Supporting Actress nomination for Thieves Like U
I know that fellow Texas Jonathan Caouette (TARNATION) was going to write something for her so it's especially sad she passed at this time. I think they would have been able to create something special together.
An absolute queen and underrated, unique talent. She also seemed to be an incredibly nice and kind person.
Dan H -- I didn't know that. Somehow, it makes me even sadder.